| "He is not the ashes" |
[Jan. 11th, 2008|12:17 pm] |
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| |  sad | ] |
FLORENCE - Lord, was he fast. That's what everybody said about Miles Adams.
'He would blow people's doors off,' said Steve Naboicheck, his soccer coach at Fitchburg State College. 'The first time I saw him at practice, I said, 'This is gonna be good.' Fast as lightning. And solid. If you ran into him, there was a good chance you were gonna fall down.'
'He was our teammate,' said Naboicheck. 'He was our friend. That goofy smile, that great attitude - he was such a positive addition.'
Adams' teammates, 25 strong, wore their colors to the Elks Club Saturday afternoon and joined a standing-room crowd of over 300 people there to say their goodbyes to a life-embracing kid from Northampton who died early last Sunday, not five minutes from where he grew up. Adams, 18, was reportedly walking on a snow-packed Interstate 91 when he was struck by a tractor-trailer and then a car. The impact of those harrowing seconds was felt by hearts in Northampton and beyond.
'Losing Miles is our community's collective loss and our collective nightmare,' said family friend Joan Schaffer, who talked about the struggles and fears parents go through to keep their children safe. 'Don't go too close to the edge of the cliff, look both ways, wear a helmet, wear a seat belt, don't drink and drive. We start off on our parenting journey thinking we can protect our children from every peril. We quickly learn we cannot.'
'The death of a child is an unimaginable thing,' said Nina Dudley, Adams' mother. 'The days and weeks ahead will be so, so difficult. But this community has shown such an outpouring of love, from all walks. His too brief life will be remembered. Keep him in your hearts and we will, too.'
'I loved Miles more than I can say,' said Russell Adams, his father. 'We thought we would have him forever.'
Though the teen's parents had been divorced for many years, they lived in adjacent homes on Williams Street, providing a stability for Miles and his sister India, 19, that very few children of divorced couples enjoy.
'I will miss him every single minute of every single day of the rest of my life,' said India Adams.
Family friend Fern Selesnick remembered the comedy routines he did with his sister. 'Even as an infant he had charm,' she said. 'He was the kind of kid every parent would want.'
Selesnick recalled cooking food on Jewish holidays and how Miles couldn't get enough of it. 'He couldn't remember the difference between Hanukkah and Passover, but he could remember the food,' she said. 'We called him the 'Three-Matzo-Ball Kid.'
Adams started drawing as a toddler and fell in love with film in high school. He was a huge hit at Hamp High film festivals and was in his first year studying film and video at Fitchburg State College.
'He was struck by a range of talent,' said Selesnick. 'Now we all grieve and ask why.'
Though his death has made no sense to anyone who knew him, Adams' life was said to be one of merriment, adventure and commitment.
Michael Jacobson-Hardy, Adams' photography teacher at Hamp High, said the teen loved to make the kind of pictures that made people laugh, and pointed to the mock Sports Illustrated cover behind him that had Adams in a boxing pose, gloves up, with the headline: 'Miles Adams, back from retirement.' But Jacobson-Hardy also told of Adams voluntarily coming to his classroom at 7:30 each morning to help other students, something he didn't have to do, something he got no credit for.
'Miles, I'll never forget you,' said Jacobson-Hardy. 'The world is a better place because you were in it.'
He was said to be fearless. Many young people are. But he had tremendous athletic ability and the confidence and strength that went with it. He'd try anything and keep plugging at it until he got it.
And then there was that goofy smile, that scrunchy, impish, ever-present grin everybody talks about, the one that's in all the pictures. Aaron Berkenwald, Adams' friend and teammate from Northampton High, can see it plain as day if he closes his eyes. 'The emotion in his face is what I remember most,' said Berkenwald, who told of discovering a rope swing with Adams last summer by the banks of the Connecticut River, and how Adams repeatedly had trouble executing a flip into the water, landing on his belly, his back, or worse-really taking a beating. 'But he emerged every time with that trademark goofy grin, and said, 'I'll get it next time.' I can recall very few times when he didn't get it next time,' said Berkenwald.
Friendship was important to Miles Adams. And friendship was a lifetime pact. His roommate at Fitchburg State, Gabe Milici from Williamsburg, has been a friend, he said, 'from birth.' Milici last talked to Adams the midnight before his death.
'A giant hole opened up in my heart,' said Milici, who told of his kindergarten days with Adams in Williamsburg, and how he thought he'd lost his friend forever when the family moved to faraway Northampton.
'I was transformed from best friend to brother,' said Milici. 'I made my first movie with him. We made a movie that got us into college. I miss him so much it hurts. We should all feel lucky to have known such an incredible person.'
'He was so funny and so great and he told me he could feel that I liked him,' said friend Jackie Miller, who said she filmed Adams outdoors trying to execute a Jackie Chan-type kip-up move and that he kept slipping on the ice, take after take. 'He just wouldn't give up,' she said. 'He never gave up.'
Marty Susskind, a Hamp High teammate, recalled the impact, both spiritually and talent-wise, that Adams had on a soccer field, and talked about the first year they were thrown together as Blue Devil forwards. 'He'd have his head down, truckin' through three, four guys - like a tornado. In our first two or three games we hadn't scored a single goal. I went to the coach: 'I can't play with this guy. We're exact opposites and he's a nutcase.'
But Susskind remembers the exact day it all changed, the day Adams took a high arcing pass from Susskind, did something impossible with it, and was an All-Star from that moment on. 'He did five separate touches with it - on his chest, his knee, his thigh - and somehow got it in. I wish you could have seen his face. On the bus on the way home, he said, 'That's how we should do it.' I didn't even know what it was!' Susskind said with a laugh.
It's not known how Adams found himself on foot on a dangerous highway in pre-dawn hours. He was on his way home, most think. Some say he may have been trying to cross the highway, and with visibility being an issue, thought he had just enough time to make it. Maybe he slipped, like that time with the Jackie Chan stunt.
Adams' cousin Taylor expressed disbelief, and said the enormity of the loss has yet to sink in.
'I'm waiting for the cannonball to find me,' she said. 'He is not the ashes inside the urn. He did not die last Sunday morning. Miles Adams will never die.'
'Nina and Russ, our hearts go out to you,' said Joan Schaffer. 'You are all one of us and we are all one of you. We wish you strength in days that lie ahead.' |
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